Skyrim Australian street date broken

Major specialist retail chains have responded to isolated street date breaks with a mass release of The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim.

EB Games and GAME both announced the game would be available for sale at around 3:00 PM this afternoon, in line with a mysterious, unsourced rumour of earlier today.

Individuals report Harvey Norman and other department chains now have the game openly for sale.

Unfortunately for PC players, the game utilises Steamworks, and Steam has not updated its Australian release date in line with the early launch. The PC version is expected to unlock at midnight.

Earlier today. Kotaku reported at least one Big W had the game on sale, but pulled it from sale within hours.

Other rumours circulating on Twitter and on forums mentioned isolated sales at individual outlets of chain department stores - Target and Kmart being the most often cited - likely due to clerk error.

Local distributors usually crack down on broken street dates when department store clerks are unaware of sales embargoes, but last month a Battlefield 3 incident brought release forward by a half a day, disrupting midnight launch plans.